SSI Live Podcast – Ep 118 – The China Strategic Competition Seminar

In this episode of SSI Live, Major Brennan Deveraux interviews Colonel Kyle Marcrum and Lieutenant Colonel Paul Milas on the SSI-developed China Strategic Competition Seminar. The conversation explores the origin and relevance of the seminar, highlighting the initiative to educate Army officers on understanding how the People’s Republic of China implements its instruments of national power, its objectives, and its activities both in the Indo-Pacific and globally.

Brennan Deveraux

Welcome to SSI Live. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the guests, and not necessarily those of the Department of the Army, the US Army War College, or any other agency of the US government. I’m your guest host, Major Brennan Deveraux, filling in once again for John Deni, who is on sabbatical this academic year.

I’m joined today by my SSI coworkers, Colonel Kyle Marcrum and Lieutenant Colonel Paul Milas. Colonel Marcrum is new to SSI, as well as to the China Landpower Studies Center (CLSC). He is an Indo-Pacific foreign area officer (FAO) who served at the Defense Intelligence Agency, the office of the Secretary of Defense, and as a military attaché in China, Nepal, Bangladesh, and Taiwan.

Lieutenant Colonel Milas is also a foreign area officer at SSI and has been our resident Director of African Affairs for the last few years. He previously served at the US Embassy in Rwanda and at the Defense Intelligence Agency.

For this conversation, we’re going to be exploring the SSI-developed China Strategic Competition Seminar (CSC). Colonel Milas, I’m going to start with you.

I’ll just start with the most straightforward question. What is the China Strategic Competition Seminar or what we call it around the office, CSC.

Paul Milas

Thanks, Brennan. So, the CSC seminar is designed to provide foreign area officers, FA [Functional Area] 59 strategists, and really the everyday warfighter with the tools really necessary to compete with China in this world of great power competition. The course focuses on understanding how the PRC implements its instruments of national power, its objectives, [and] its activities both in the Indo-Pacific and globally.

And the aim of the course is to identify opportunities for our army to counter China’s narrative, counter their initiatives, and advance US interests.

Deveraux

If I could follow up, what was kind of the spark that led to this class and how long has it been going?

Milas

So I became involved with this in early 2023 when I first got to SSI. The year prior, and sometime before that, some of the senior Indo-Pacific foreign area officers identified that there was possibly a gap in our China knowledge due to the reorganization and consolidation of the FAO areas of concentration in the Indo-Pacific. And they recognize that all Indo-Pacific FAOs really need to have a baseline knowledge of the PRC [People’s Republic of China] to better support the joint force.

And they saw that some of that was possibly lacking due to that consolidation. Brigadier General Pat Teague, the SDO-DATT (Senior Defense Official- Defense Attache) in Beijing at the time, has really been the main driver of this course and implementing this course. And so, again, a few years ago, about 2022 or so, the USARPAC (US Army Pacific Command) Security Cooperation Division wrote an information paper with an idea to create a course similar to the European Russia Way of War course, but [for] this one we focus on the PRC.

And so, during that whole process of thinking about a course, recognizing that we need more China expertise, they reached out to the Army War College and asked us to develop a curriculum because we are an academic institution. And at the same time all this was happening, SSI decided to stand up a China Landpower Studies Center.

And so it only made sense to bring them into the fold and start developing this course, leaning on their China expertise. And so with Josh Arostegui, the [chair] of the China Landpower Studies Center, we started developing a curriculum, the lessons, syllabus, schedule, and the program of instruction. And so we ran our first pilot course in February of 2024.

Deveraux

The course itself, who’s teaching, is this you and Josh who [are] teaching the course? How many students are out there? Is this a TDY [temporary duty] kind of experience?

Milas

So we run two courses per year. Each course is about two weeks long. Our first course was ten days. We adjusted that initial course, the pilot course, shortened it down to eight days. And then we finally settled on the nine-day model that we’re running now. And so we run that 9-day model twice per year.

And so this course is really geared to Indo-Pacific foreign area officers. And so we’ll TDY those individuals throughout the region back to Fort Shafter in Hawaii to attend the course. But then we also pull in individuals who are on island, some strategists that are on island, some typical normal warfighters that are on the island. Most recently, we had a 25th ID [Infantry Division], G-2 person that attended our course. And so it was great having her perspective within the course.

And so really, we’re pulling from anybody, captain, major, or even lieutenant colonels who really need China expertise, but focusing primarily on the Indo-Pacific foreign area officers. As far as our teaching team, we primarily rely on folks from our China Landpower Studies Center. So we’ve got a few research professors and instructors that will come out to the course to assist with the teaching.

But then we also bring in TRADOC (US Army Training and Doctrine Command) G-2 personnel. We rely on USARPAC personnel. We’ll have General Clark, the USARPAC Commander come in and provide his insights on the course. The Deputy Commanding General, Major General Winter, attended the course and provided his perspectives. And we’ll also bring in some of those other resident and island folks, strategists, G-5, G-2 personnel to help instruct the course.

Kyle Marcrum

I would also add that, you know, this was my first attendance to one of these courses, and I was really impressed with the fact that, you know, this is a course intended to teach FAOs about China, but then we also have the people, senior leaders, like the USARPAC commander, came to not only talk about what his goals and objectives are in the Indo-Pacific, but also to kind of talk about his perspective.

We had all sorts of senior leaders. We also had senior attachés from the field coming in, such as Brigadier General Teague, who’s currently, he was the senior defense official and defense attaché in Beijing. He’s now in New Delhi. But then we also brought in Colonel Warr, the Army attaché in Beijing. It allowed them to share their knowledge and experience and things like, you know, Colonel Warr, just talking about the recent Chinese parade that had just happened.

Maybe that means for the United States and others in the region, it really helps to bring that home for these brand new FAOs, which is really our target audience, is FAOs who are coming through the pipeline, really helps them to understand what’s going on inside the embassies and out in the field, as well as hearing from the commander, USARPAC, seeing how they can better inform the commander, help him to make his decisions.

Deveraux

When you start talking about the actual content of the class, what level of classification are you able to go to in there?

Marcrum

Yeah, that’s a great question. So we mainly do unclassified instruction, but we are able to go up to secret level. The main thing with it being primarily unclassified, and I’ll emphasize this almost all the time, is that the Chinese, there’s so much about China that’s out in the unclassified realm that we really can use to understand and better understand their decision-making process and their objectives in the region.

Milas

And with that classification level, the great thing about teaching, mostly at the unclassified level, is that when our students leave the course, they can share what they’ve learned in the course with either their other fellow soldiers, FAOs, but they could also share it with international partners as well. So we kind of get a common understanding and common learning through what we teach in the course with our partners and allies.

Deveraux

I think that’s a great point. And it’s not just the students’ ability to share, and this is one of the things I actually really like about CLSC, and it’s been really helpful for me learning about China is because we operate primarily in my unclassified side, we can put that information just out to the world, and it really builds on, instead of stuff being stovepiped, maybe in a G-2 shop or on island, where they’re really, that is their focus.

It gets it out to the force. And just as important, it gets it out to academia, it gets it out to other people who will weigh in back and say, “actually, no, I disagree. Here’s why.” And I think the CLSC really helps the conversation.

Marcrum

You talked about how the CLSC, you know, builds the knowledge and distributes it to the force. I think that the CLSC, as a group of full-time researchers, is able to expand and build on the US Army’s knowledge of China. And then this, among other forums, you know, our publications in this class and others helps us to bring that knowledge to the force.

And I think that that’s a key component is, you know, spreading the knowledge, making sure that we’re all aware of what we’re trying to achieve, what China’s trying to achieve, and how we compete with that.

Deveraux

I know for me personally, the aspect of them, almost all the researchers speaking Mandarin. Or reading Mandarin, I don’t hear them speaking it a ton, but I know they’re reading. It is invaluable for even projects I’m working on where I talk with Josh and he goes, “Oh, hey, actually, here’s what China thinks about that” and sends me over what China published on it.

That’s awesome, and it totally changes my assertion to here is actually what’s happening. I will transition us a little bit to this last class you guys just did. And actually, Colonel Milas, I think this is probably your last class. Colonel Marcrum you already said was your first. Can you talk a little bit just about the experience of this last class and you know, what you thought kind of handing off this big project?

Milas

Absolutely. So this was the fourth iteration of the course that we just executed. And it happened in early September at Fort Shafter. We had 17 students in this class. Total throughout the four classes that we’ve had, we’ve trained about 90 or so, foreign area officers and warfighters. And so this course model, we’ve refined each of our courses through senior leader feedback and from student feedback.

So I think this course was probably one of the better ones that we’ve executed in the model that we used. Just to let you know about kind of the construct of the course is that we start off with the PRC broad macro level, talking about PRC instruments of national power. Then we discuss PRC activities and relationships in a regional and also a global context.

After that, we transitioned more into the instrument, the military instrument of National power, focusing on the PLA [People’s Liberation Army]. And then the last part of the of course, we transitioned into understanding US strategy in the Indo-Pacific and the role of land power. And the last day and a half of the course, we do an exercise that allows the students to put everything that they’ve learned throughout the previous eight or nine days into practice in kind of an experiential exercise that they can apply to possibly what they’ll do in their future assignments.

Deveraux

If I can follow up, two things, I’ll start with, I know you get a lot of feedback, you said you get feedback from the students. I’ve seen you managing those surveys and putting together the nifty charts for the seniors. I’m curious. You’ve got 90 through the course now. Are you getting any feedback from the field? Have you had the, you know, that lieutenant colonel who was in seminar one or seminar two reach back and say, “hey, I really like this” or “hey, I’ve been telling people about,” or “this skill really applied to” kind of feedback, that real world post-course feedback.

Milas

We have. I’ve received several emails from students from previous classes just highlighting the importance of the course, how much they learned and how much it’s helped them in their positions that they’re in now. Most of the course right now is by word of mouth, and that’s how people generally find out about this course and the feedback that we’ve received, and the people who reach out to us have heard that it’s a great course from those people who have previously attended the course. So we do have plans to do, you know, long-term surveys to get a better understanding of how our material and how our lessons are impacting them in their future positions. But right now, anecdotally, yes, we’ve had a lot of good feedback and, and this, of course, being very beneficial.

Deveraux

I think that the anecdotal feedback might not look as good on a PowerPoint slide as that, that survey. But from personal experience, actually hearing someone say, you know, down the line “this was useful,” means so much more than, you know, “I checked box number four,” you know, “strongly agree,” which is also important, not to disparage it, but that longer-term impact, I think, is really valuable.

I know you’re limited on how many people are attending the course, and I don’t know if that’ll eventually adjust, but are these students provided some pre-reading material? And then looking at it from an interested candidate who would love to take a TDY to Hawaii but probably will not get approved, is there any way if, say, I wanted just the syllabus to kind of see what people are working or, or the reading, would you guys be opposed to having that be something that’s open to…

Marcrum

I would be very much open to it. One of the main things that we like to provide is the resources so others can do their own homework. We do provide pre-readings for the course and readings throughout the course, although it’s not very heavy. But what we do provide during the course is a lot of recommended readings for [the] future.

And so we could provide those to anyone that wants to reach out to us by email. And we can provide you with the full list. Definitely happy to help anyone, even if they’ve got a specific question or anything like that. We’re always, I mean, that’s what we do at the CLSC is we help the Army build their knowledge.

Deveraux

I think it might be worthwhile to even just pen a short little article on what the CSC seminar is for the CLSC website. And then, if you’re open to it, maybe even have the syllabus either available, or to your point, it could be by request, but I’d be curious to see it. So I might be one of those first to offer that.

Milas

So something that we have for the course and it’s really just for the students who have enrolled. We’ve got an MS Teams site, a Microsoft Teams site that is basically a repository of all the information that the students receive throughout the course, all the lesson plans of the PowerPoints, the readings, the syllabus, something that they can go back to.

And it’s still active even after they graduate the course. And we tell them upon completion of the course that they’re more than able to pull that stuff from those sites and share it with their counterparts. We do, like Colonel Marcrum said, we do think that the CLSC is that organization that is there to spread knowledge, and this course is just part of that sharing knowledge with the broader force.

Deveraux

Colonel Marcrum, if I can transition over to you, just real quick and you already kind of talked about it a little bit, but this was your first course doing the seminar, the CSC seminar. Can you talk a little bit about the trip out there, how you kind of fit into the puzzle?

Marcrum

One of the things I think, you know, as I said, I was really impressed with the senior leaders that are that participate in it, but also think that we’ve done a really good job. Paul’s done a really good job, of kind of shaping this to where we have the experts come in to teach. One of the things that I definitely impressed by, you know, I’ve a long time worked with Rick Gunnell. He was one of the instructors on this latest one, along with Peter Wood and they did it. Just their depth of knowledge really helps to bring that home. I think a big part of it is the students do the reading before. They come in, there’s a brief presentation, but the question & answers is where we really get a lot of knowledge that come from the instructors, help the students to learn more in-depth and more in their area.

I think that I was really impressed by the level of knowledge of these two individuals. I think that with my coming in, I can lend a little bit of that experience from the field. Although particularly my knowledge from Beijing is pre-COVID. It’s a little bit dated, but we have, you know, this I’m able to hopefully kind of tie together the research and the experience part of it.

I’m hoping that, in this next one, we can continue to make this seminar more practical. You know, these are the target audiences, the FAOs and the strategists going to the field kind of talking about how the competition will play in their future jobs. I’d like to see a little bit of that. I would definitely like to see a lot more students.

And we do have a limitation on the number that we can hold, but we’d like to be able to fill that in. And then one of the other things not kind of related to the seminar, the strategic competition seminar will stay, but also looking at more adaptive classes. We want to bring that knowledge to the field, thinking about how we can have versions of this seminar that we can export to other locations.

So kind of linking through all of those is where I see my role coming into this. Paul’s done a phenomenal job of shaping this one. I think the strategic competition seminar is fairly set with just the, you know, the practicality of it coming from, for these students. But I think that, going forward, it’s really kind of thinking about how we can get more people to learn this knowledge.

Milas

One thing, I’d be remiss not to say is that we, like Colonel Marcrum, said, we do rely on a wide variety of faculty. Like I mentioned previously, the TRADOC G-2 and Peter Wood, but the Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies APCSS, that’s one of the organizations that’s been integral to developing this course and specifically Colonel Matt Kent out there.

He was involved early on with developing this course, and he opened up the APCSS doors and invited the course in. So each course we spend a half a day there at the center to hear from their experts as well from their faculty, provides us with a different perspective, not the military perspective, but more of an academic perspective.

And so it’s a real valuable visit and a real valuable time that that we get to spend out there to learn and hear from those experts as well.

Deveraux

COL Marcrum made a point about the kind of the mix of the academic and the professional. I think there’s something to be said that I remember going through the Basic Strategic Art Program for strategists, and one of the things we we’re very curious about as that coming into the new functional areas, “how do I communicate with the GO (General Officer)?” “What’s my role on the staff?” Some things like that.

So I think the inherent value of having a senior foreign area officer, even if it’s not in their region, but a senior foreign area officer, having the actual commander or a deputy commander come in, a G2 come in, really adds to what you’re already talking about with the hey, here’s the expertise that you’re getting from the academic side.

Marcrum

You know, one of the things, and Brigadier General Teague talked about this during the seminar, but one of the things, you know, particularly for the FAOs and the strategists, when you’re transitioning, you know, you’re a captain, you’re used to working at the battalion level. And then you suddenly transition to being a foreign area officer. You suddenly are thrown from the tactical to the strategic, grand strategic level.

And so, learning how to communicate at the strategic level, the interagency level, how do I talk to the ambassador as their advisor on military affairs on this country? And on the United States? How do I talk to the ambassador? What can I present to the USARPAC Commander that is useful information for him? Because, you know, he’s got a G2 that’s presenting him intelligence.

What am I lending to that commander or to whatever agency? What am I doing that is helpful to them? I think it’s such a huge change for the FAOs and the strategist and other officers as they transition to this strategic area, that it’s very helpful to hear from the seniors that have made that transition. The researchers and the academics have this fountain of knowledge, but translating that knowledge into practical, how do I use that in the field, is where these senior [leaders]come into play.

And that’s where I hope that I can continue to lend to the course.

Deveraux

Looking at my transition as a strategist, I was lucky enough to bounce to a couple of different organizations, but I had some peers whose most senior experience was at a battalion, a very tactical battalion, and their first job as a strategist was on the Joint Staff or at a combatant command. And they’re doing great, and they’re really smart people. That’s why they do their transfer. But you want to talk about a culture shock, just the ability to talk to a colonel in their field who’s done that transition, or to talk to a general officer who’s on that receiving end, who says, “here’s how I receive information,” or the G2 who says, “here’s how I integrate with the rest of the staff” I think is really valuable.

Marcrum

I was very fortunate in my FAO career. My first true FAO assignment was at the Defense Intelligence Agency. And I know some people will argue that that’s not an advantage, but I think it very much was because when I went to DIA, and I was studying Chinese leadership and decision-making, and then they had the 2012 leadership transition, and I was briefing all of these people in the Pentagon, all these senior officers.

I had a time of transition where, you know, I was able to learn and see how these briefings are done, and then I’m the one doing the briefing. It really did give me that transition time. But not all FAOs are able to have that kind of transition experience.

And particularly with some, you know, some countries that we have our senior defense officials in, and we go straight from you are a fully trained FAO major, and congratulations, you’re the SDO-DATT [senior defense official and defense attaché] at this embassy. And welcome to the deep end. And so I think that there is a lot of value to be said for that side of it as well.

I mean, again, our primary objective is to teach competition with China, right, and how that can play out in the field. But also making sure that they’re able to do that in a way that’s useful to the commander, I think is great.

Deveraux

I think all around the CSC seminar sounds really interesting, and I’m disappointed that in the two years I’ve been here, I’ve not been invited to Hawaii to attend. Like I said, I have been to presentations about the upcoming course, and I have seen lots of slides about how successful the course was. It’s awesome. It’s a good program.

And I love that SSI was able to take the lead on it, because I think that there is a perception that SSI, the Army’s think tank, is full of, you know, people locked in their office doing a bunch of research, which isn’t necessarily untrue, but it’s so much more than that, right. And so I thought this was a great opportunity to highlight how our researchers coordinate and work with and support the force, whether that’s through engagements that I know that they’re having or through the publications, you know, where they’re sparking conversation. And this was a unique aspect where it’s literally partnered with the force, going out to the island and teaching, not the War College students that, you know, we also work with and teach, but teaching the foreign area officers, the strategists, other folks on the island, you know, and sharing that expertise. So I think that was really valuable.

And then if I could ask one last question on the course. This sounds like such a good model, specifically for the Indo-Pacific FAOs. Do you think that it’s replicatable? You know, could this be something as a tool for Middle East FAOs? You know, for Europe FAOs? Is this something that big Army needs to relook and say, “hey, is there something else we need to add in the pipeline to try to make sure our FAOs are being exposed to this big thoughts, big thinking, strategic competition?” Beyond just the language, the culture and whatever else is in the pipeline.

Marcrum

I’m biased as a [Indo-Pacific] FAO that, you know, [a] Mandarin speaker, [that has] always been studying well, been studying China my entire FAO career. I think that all of our FAOs going to all embassies need to learn about how competition plays out across the globe, and I think that there’s something to be said about strategists, you know, being the Army’s planners, having you come in and learn how this goes, I think there’s a lot to be said for that. At the end of the day, though, you know, we are in a real world that has funding limitations.

And so I think that it would be great to say that every combatant command needs to be funding one of these courses designed for their FAOs or for their strategists or for their staff. It would be great to get all the staff. In the real world of funding and time constraints, I think that that’s a decision that the combatant commander would be better to make.

But again, I’m heavily biased. I think that if we want to really compete, if we really want to see US objectives succeed, I think that this combination of FAOs and strategists talking about how we compete overseas, having not only the instruction, but also getting those people in the same room where we can kind of talk through each of these problems. I think that’s hugely beneficial to the force.

I have, I talked earlier about how I want to do the adaptive courses, how we want to kind of get, you know, smaller, more boutique classes that can kind of some… maybe we can accomplish it that way. But yeah.

Milas

To echo what Colonel Marcrum said, this course is absolutely valuable for any FAO, regardless of their region, with the current model that we have, you know, we are limited in the number of students that we have due to financial constraints, but we have had other AOCs, other area of concentration FAOs, within the course. I think today we’ve had about ten outside of Indo-Pacific FAOs attend the course.

So we are hitting some of them as able. But I think there is definitely a need to have something like this at other combatant commands.

Marcrum

I think you brought up a great point, Paul, when you talked about the other regions being in the class. I think that also really lent a lot of value and helped feed a lot of discussion when we had, you know, the AFRICOM (US Africa Command) FAO there to be able to talk through a lot of those things. Not that you’re not there for that course, but it helps to feed those conversations as we continue to go.

I also want to emphasize, you know, we are limited on class space, but I want to encourage even non-FAO non-strategists that are in Honolulu to apply to go to the course. I think that there is a lot of benefit to having, like you said earlier, you know, we had a G-2 officer, we’ve had targeting officers, these individuals in the course helped to lend a lot to the value of the course itself.

But also we, you know, we want to get the knowledge out there. And if there’s room in the classroom, we definitely want to have those people as part of it.

Deveraux

I think there’s some underlying logic on how we build seminars at a Command General Staff College or the War College, where we get that diverse perspective for a reason, because we don’t all look at the problem, you know, and just see nails that we need to hit with our hammer. And that’s great. I love those guys, and I love having them in my group. But having those diverse perspectives is probably really valuable, just for the conversation.

Gentlemen, I really appreciate the time. I think that this is a valuable opportunity and I hope people take advantage of it. I hope to see it grow in whatever way we can. And maybe that first step is just helping people get access to some of the material. Material from the course or just material that we’re doing our best to put out, like we talked about on the unclassified side.

So, I would encourage our listeners to check out the China Landpower Studies Center website. You’ll see a lot of good stuff coming out of there. And maybe something on the CSC seminar. I don’t know, it’s not up to me, but I thank everybody for the time. Listeners, for more Army War College podcasts, check out Decisive Point, Conversations on Strategy, CLSC Dialogues, and A Better Peace.